


Honey, You're my Angel

by SebaDA



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, M/M, Wings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-15
Updated: 2015-07-15
Packaged: 2018-04-09 10:41:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4345430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SebaDA/pseuds/SebaDA
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam grows wings, and Dean has to deal with his feelings for his brother.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Honey, You're my Angel

**Author's Note:**

> This is my summer baby, and I am so happy with how it turned out. 
> 
> Only warning: there is a graphic violent description of Dean's time spent in Hell. 
> 
> Set loosely in Season Seven, but I blatantly ignored much of what happened to make this work.

Florescent, staining red light from the clock on the bedside table—3:19 a.m.—blinked steadily at Sam as his spine began to disintegrate and reorganize itself. As a consuming, molten heat wracked his body, his mind didn’t fully rise to consciousness as the pain began registering.

The sheets were damp underneath him and Sam couldn’t shift without the cheap material scraping the back of his body and heaping more sensation to his overloaded sensory system.

One small window allowed a single meager spray of moonlight into the room; still, Sam couldn’t bring himself to turn on a lamp as he attempted to stumble into the bathroom. Inconveniently, he bodily tripped over a chair near the bathroom door landing on his hands and knees. As if that wasn’t enough noise, he couldn’t help but emit a piteous, hoarse groan.

The sound had Dean reacting on base instincts before he could even process his surroundings.  “Wha’? Sam? Where are you buddy?”

            Sam, biting his lip, inhaled a guttural scream as his back renewed its efforts to rearrange his natural physiology. With a fresh glut of wetness, he could feel the back of his white sleep shift soak through.

            The light flicked on, disorienting Sam further and he collapsed on the floor in agonized defeat. Nothing in him could force his mouth open to answer Dean, due to the sounds that were clawing at the back of his throat, but rather he narrowed his focus down to breathing through the pain. His efforts earned him a nose full of musty carpet smell with a hint of stale cigarette smoke lingering in the fibers.

Undoubtedly though, any words Sam wanted to loose would be overrun with sounds of unadulterated anguish, the flavor of pain he recalled from his time in the pit.

            “Sammy? The hell’s wrong with your back?” Dean’s voice shook with a helpless panic that always thrashed his heart with its inviolate sincerity.  “Hey, Sam, c’mon. Can you stand up for me? Let’s get you into the bathroom so I can clean you up.”

            With a little concentration, Sam bobbled his head in a negative, not even remotely interested in trying to stand again. Soundlessly, with the dexterity that only someone like Dean could possess, his brother knelt beside him and pleaded coaxingly while stroking Sam’s upper arm anxiously, “Sam, please. I’ll carry you if you need.” 

            Despite the near impossibility of that statement, Sam wouldn’t put it past Dean to throw out his own back trying to carry Sam like he did when Sam was still the smaller brother. Instead, he manages, “It’s fine, Dean. It’s okay. Just give me a minute.”

            Even at an awkward angle and not being able to clearly view Dean’s face, he can still imagine the disbelieving scowl his brother is wearing at this moment. Contrarily, Dean pets a light hand through his hair, “Okay, but I’m going to try cutting through this shirt to get an idea of what we are dealing with here.”

            One tiny metal _snick_ later and Dean makes quick work of pulling the two halves of Sam’s shirt off of the affected area.

            “Well fucking hell.” Dean finally pronounced matter-of-factly, incredulity transfused in his words.

Sam grunted a questioning noise at Dean, yet before he could collect a sound explanation for Dean’s sudden use of expletives, his back exploded outward with a sickly sound and a humid, soused liquid rained down on the entire room. As Sam rapidly lost consciousness, there was blood welling on his tongue as he bit through his lip and his own howls ricocheting off the walls.

He came to with what he identified as a tremendous weight resting on his back. However, the pain that should have been plaguing him was absent, much thanks to a heavy dosage of morphine, probably. Plus, he was lying on his stomach on a bed with Dean’s scent curled so heavily around him that he guessed he could lick the roof of his mouth and lap it up.

An indescribable sense of contentment welled inside him and he drifted into a more restful sleep.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A few minutes after Sam passed out he became feverish and Dean focused on making him as comfortable as possible.

Now granted, the bedding in motels was typically not stellar. Still, Dean paced a few minutes completely absorbed in trying to find a method to keep the stupid blanket on his baby brother.

Nevertheless, heedless of Dean’s machinations, Sam doggedly kicked the off the blanket four separate times during the day before Dean gave up and just tucked the kid in with a light sheet to stop the chills wracking his brother’s frame.

Once Sam settled down, Dean finally surveyed the damage that had been done to the room.  Sam’s blood was beginning to seep into Dean’s bed where Dean bandaged what he could after disinfecting all the wounds. Beside the blood stains, the goo that Sam’s back threw up all over the room began the process of congealing into a harden mass.

Frankly, Dean never won any awards for being a spectacular housekeeper. Yet, undeniably it fell to Dean to clean up the disaster. I mean Dean was not a neat freak by any stretch of the imagination. But there wasn’t a chance in hell he could bear to be in that nasty ass room any longer without purifying some shit.

The maids allowed him access to a majority of their supplies which enabled him to finish his little room detox in under two hours. True, the antibacterial bleachy smell clung to his clothes and lurked in crevices of his hands, but he still felt proud of himself.

It only took about three hours for Sam to begin groaning and squirming about in his bed. Instantly, Dean fed him more medicine and held his brother’s hand as the morphine drug him down into the depths of his own head.

All the while, Dean repressively ignored the enormity of what was currently attached to Sam.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It wasn’t for several more hours, seven hours and thirty-nine minutes Dean noted mentally, that Sam woke fully.

As Sam’s older brother swam into view, and Sam smiled brightly up at him with dimples peeking cheekily out and everything. Though Dean knew that it was the last dregs of an alternating cocktail of pain pills and cold medication swirling about in his system that made Sam so agreeable, Dean couldn’t help but smirk back in response though the lines around his eyes betrayed his worry.

Sam tried to sit up as he spoke, “What? What is it Dean?”

However, as he rolled over to rectify himself he could clearly spy his own ailment over his shoulder.

Because suddenly there were wings, two of them. Sam had wings. As if he wasn’t a freak enough, he had to go and grow bird wings.

 His stomach rolled over itself, and even though Sam couldn’t even remember the last thing he ate he knew that it was coming back up. As he drunkenly wove his way into the bathroom to pitch over the toilet, bile flooded his mouth in an overwhelming onslaught. He clutched at the toilet seat but he couldn’t even see the white knuckled grip that he had on the porcelain as his eyes blurred with unshed tears.

“Sam, don’t freak out man. It’s going to be okay, alright. Everything’s going to be fine.” Dean didn’t include the “I’m going to take care of you” but it was hovering there and Sam could sense the truth of the unspoken words as his brother brushed his bangs off his forehead as he dry heaved over and over and over.

Then just as soon as the nausea came upon him, it left him. All that remained was a need to assess his own body, and figure out what all had been done.

“Can you help me stand up?” Dean was beside him in an instant but then had to decide how to best help Sam without touching the wings too much. Sam wrapped his own arm around Dean’s shoulders and used the support to gain his balance on his feet.

Surprisingly, the wings didn’t weigh him down and though he was unaccustomed to them it didn’t take too long to discover how to walk normally with the extra appendages. 

  It took several tries for Dean to help get all of Sam situated where he wanted him. Though what Sam saw in the mirror took his breath away.

“Dean, I look different,” he stated breathlessly.

“Hmmm?” Dean questioned from outside the bathroom. He seemed to be harboring an unwillingness to squeeze himself in the mirror as well.

“Different how?”  Then Dean poked his head around the corner and he exhaled sharply through his nose.

“My god, you’re so pretty. Like a Malibu Barbie or something,”

“Like a what?” Sam sniped back certain that Dean was teasing him.

But Dean just kept going, rubbing his face in intense concentration as more comparisons came to him, “You kinda look more like a fairy.” Dean commented and Sam snorted.

“No, I don’t.”

“You really do. The big eyes, pretty mouth,” Dean let his features slip from their teasing air to something darker, lustier for a nanosecond before adding, “and you know, you can’t overlook those giant ass wings. All we gotta do is get a little green dress and some glitter and you’d be a dead ringer for Tinkerbell.”

Sam just shook his head because he really didn’t look like Tinkerbell, damn it.

Before, he knew that he was a good-looking guy, but now, now it was more. His face was more like Dean’s almost. He had a pretty edge that teetered into feminine looking but was offset by his height, his bulk. Plus, his wings weren’t sheer gossamer things that floated prettily behind him. Rather, they were fluffier, with sleek dark brown feathers that shone and in some places especially on the insides and near the tips appeared almost golden.

Dean was right about one thing, they were definitely huge.

Proportional, he supposed. They reached past his ears and brushed against the floor. He couldn’t guess how wide his wingspan was without stretching them but fully but suffice to say they were massive.

They were covered though in fluffy patches and his instincts prickled as he felt embarrassed they were in such a condition in front of Dean.

“Ummm… hey, I uh, I need a moment,” Sam rushed out already distracted by how he was going to rid himself of all the fluff.

Dean seemed to detect his distress though, “Hey, I’ll finish cleaning them up as soon as we talk about what we’re going to do next.”

“Or how about you go get lunch and I’ll stay here.”

“Sam, you aren’t going to be able to reach most places. Just let me help.”

With a disgruntled sigh Sam shook his head, “I don’t like you seeing them like this.” His wings rattled together nosily as if to emphasize his point.

Frowning, Dean shrugged, “I hate to tell you, but that’s kinda a null point now. They were a lot worse earlier.” He jerked his head toward the bed Sam recently vacated and when Sam looked he held back an undignified squawk of surprise. There was a veritable mountain of feathery fuzz by the bed.

“You keep shedding them and I think it’s because your wings are so new.” 

“I’m sorry,” Sam whispered horrified but his brother just shook his head.

“Hey, it’s new. But trust me; I’ve cleaned up worse from you. Still, these are the things we need to talk about like now.”

Sam nodded and sat down trying to hold his wings as close to his body as possible. Dean looked at him strangely, “Dude, is that even comfortable? Shouldn’t you let fly free? Hang loose?”

There wasn’t time to debate this small point though when all Sam wanted was to try grooming himself so he looked more presentable. Dean picked up on his impatience, “All right fine. What do you remember?”

Sam recalled the pain, his back splitting open, and then passing out.

“Hey, consider yourself lucky. After you passed out it got kind nasty. You like gave birth to those things,” Sam winced because he did not want to imagine what that whole process looked like.

“But,” Dean continued on, “after like, a half an hour, all the grossness on your back just kinda healed itself up.”

“Healed itself?” Sam questioned.

“Yeah, like the gashes where you were bleeding from after you sprouted those,” Dean gestures vaguely at the wings.

“You probably could have pulled them out while they were sprouting before they healed up,” Sam surmised after a moment.

Horror crawled across the older hunter’s face, “Uh, dude, that is like the dumbest thing you’ve ever said.”

Affronted Sam threw back, “Really, Dean, cause letting me grow wings was such a spectacular move!”

“You know, Sam, I figured you were pretty damn attached to your spine and wouldn’t really want to be paralyzed when I ripped out the fucking wings that are fused to. your. spine!” Sam couldn’t really argue with that.

Then a new though occurred to him, “Hey did you run the tests on them. Maybe I’ve been cursed.” Sam knew he was scraping for excuses especially since lately they hadn’t been hunting any creature that would have the ability to cast this potent of a spell on him.

Dean shook his head again, “I called Bobby while you were out. Didn’t take him too long to rule out the possibility of you being cursed. We’re pretty damn sure those wings are yours for whatever reason. We just don’t know why you grew them.”

Something ate at the back of Sam’s mind; there was something, something that must have happened while he was trapped in the cage with Lucifer. For the moment, he shook off the unease, “Well, how am I going to hunt with these things?”

Dean made a disagreeing noise, “Nuh uh, you’re going to be out of commission for a while.”

“Dean, you can’t really expect me to live in this craptastic room indefinitely. I’ll go insane.”

“Of course not, I’m not cruel. I, um, I bought us a cabin. We can stay there for however long it takes to get everything straightened out.” Dean rushed the last part out and hunched in on himself a bit as if expecting Sam to ridicule his idea.

“That’s a great idea,” Sam quickly enforced not wanting Dean to get his feelings hurt. Something in Sam’s chest almost purred at the idea that Dean bought them a permanent place to stay to keep Sam safe.

However, his wings started itching and Sam couldn’t really focus well on the conversation anymore. After shifting restlessly for six minutes straight, Dean finally intervened; “You want me to take care of them now?” 

Sam practically threw himself on the bed and spread his wings in supplication. It helped that he didn’t have anything but his briefs on so there wouldn’t be any clothes hampering either of their movements. But Dean made a mental note to talk to Sam about the clothes things about the wing grooming session; shirts were going to be problematic. Without hesitation, Dean followed suit and folded himself onto the side of the bed.

The wings were vibrating in irritation as the pale yellow fluff seemed to clog the feathers. Dean had done this routine now almost ten times but all those times Sam had been unconscious. Before beginning the grooming, Dean released a silent entreaty, that plucking the little fluffiness off of Sam’s wings wouldn’t hurt him now that he was awake.

At the first touch, Sam let out an embarrassingly high pitch squeak and pressed his wings determinedly back into Dean’s hands. The fingers that combed through the middle feathers on his wings sent flares of pleasure zinging through his nervous system.

Sam would be lying if he said he never imagined what Dean’s hands would feel like on his body. He didn’t encourage incestuous thoughts, per say, but if they encroached in his mental space occasionally while he was jerking off, he didn’t exactly beat himself up over it. I mean, really, who could judge. When you have a brother as soul-crushingly beautiful as Dean it would have been a feat for the Pope to have pure thoughts 24/7.

To add to that, Dean has fantastic hands: hands that moved with an elegant grace of an artist clutching a slogged down paintbrush or a musician plucking rapid-fire notes while onstage. His hands though weren’t too pretty and were adorned with a lifetime of callouses bred from handling guns and hunting. To have those exact same hands rasp through his wings set him off like nothing else.

Breathy moans and half-bitten off pleas began filling up the room, but Sam couldn’t wrap his mind around the fact that those noises were coming from his own mouth. He writhed about on the bed, while Dean’s hands roved over every sensitive inch of his wings trying to set them all in the right direction and pluck the last of the newborn baby chick fuzz.

“Sam,” Dean’s voice wasn’t harsh but sounded so gravelly like it had dropped another octave, “dude, am I hurting you?” Sam could only trust himself to shake his head viciously. “Then what’s going on? Sit still, will ya.”

And with a valiant effort, Sam did endeavor to be good while Dean finished grooming him but his cock was so hard any twitch had him rubbing painfully against the cotton material of his briefs. Finally, against his will he whined out, “Feels good Dean. So good. Can’t even think straight feels so good.”

Dean chuckled above him but with a force note like his vocal cords had been scraped across a cheese grater, “Hell, yeah, it does. Cause I give awesome massages and this isn’t really that different. I mean plus you like make your own oil which makes everything easier.”

At any other time, Sam probably would have questioned the oil thing but at the moment all he could focus on was his likelihood of rubbing one out on the bed before Dean finished doing his thing. Just as he started rolling his hips against the mattress, hoping the motion was subtle enough Dean wouldn’t recognize where his current train of thought was going, Dean scrubbed down his wings one last time.

“Alright, kiddo, all finished.” Sam couldn’t even move. Not without alerting Dean to his rapidly-escalating-to-emergency boner situation.

“Umm, thanks Dean. I’m going to lay here a while, might go back to sleep.”

Dean snorted, “Sure you’re not hungry?” and when Sam’s stomach growled in response, Sam cursed his biology, his body, and everything in between.

“Well that answers that question. Look while you take care of Sam Jr., I’ll go get us some grub. I’ll be back in twenty minutes.”

Even though Sam had a blush that he believed spread from his toes and all the way back to his hairline, he was grateful for his brother reading him so accurately.

 He couldn’t even really begin to grasp the intense physical reaction his body had while Dean was grooming him. Intellectually, he recognized that there were emotions unearthed while Dean cared for his new additions but he couldn’t even begin to define those because the sensations had been so intense like he stuck his wings in an outlet but instead of being electrocuted, he became unbearably aroused.

Sam sorely hoped this was a one-time reaction.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As the seasons edged from spring and into summer, the wind rushing through the Impala’s open windows felt pleasantly breezy and warm. The balmy air ruffled Sam’s feathers, which were currently situated in the back seat bound together with multiple Ace bandages to prevent them from banging Dean in the face as he drove to their cabin.

Even though Sam lay on his belly in the backset, it became obvious when Dean’s body lost the faux casual air he had affected yesterday after he came back to the motel room bearing enough food to feed a medium size family.  They had both acknowledged the fact that Sam had been jacking it while Dean was out, had been driven to that point by Dean’s deft finger-play, the awareness creeping almost shamefully on their consciousness.

As Dean had studiously wolfed down his bacon cheeseburger—managing to transform the art of eating sinful as the grease painted his lips shiny and he took time to lovingly suck the salt from the French fries from each finger—he hadn’t looked Sam in the eye.

 And the conversation that Sam tried to force fought through awkward lilting pauses before meeting a premature demise ending in conspicuous silence. That silence endured for the remainder of the evening and persisted through sundown and into the night until Dean finally announced that it was probably safe to move without anyone catching a peek of Sam.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Without turning around in the driver’s seat, Dean could hear the gears whorling around in Sam’s head as his baby brother taxed away, trying string his puzzle out so that he could piece Dean together again.  

The telepathy that they developed over the years most likely bred from existing in each other’s space since Dean had been four years old; from surviving in a world together against the evil; from being partners, brothers, and sharing love that no one could understand.

Mind-reading, freaky reacting- in-unison fraternal link aside though, Sam watched Dean. Maybe most little siblings studied older ones. Sam checked Dean relentlessly for signs of panic, anxiety, depression, antagonism, apathy. Sam had a mental catalogue of Dean’s expressions, moods, actions so he could usually diagnose Dean with a glance and aptly decide how to handle the situation.

Right now though, Sam was at a lost and Dean’s typical clue-giving, visual cues were muted. Dean locked himself in his own mind and it wasn’t the same blank expression that Dean wore when he blissed out in his baby with miles of open highway in front of them because no one dying so there wasn’t any rush to get anywhere. Yet, Dean’s concentration drifted miles and miles away as his thoughts abstractedly concluded,

_Those who believed that humans lived in an indifferent universe obviously did not have their facts straight. Whatever forces conspired in the heavenly abyss devised tortures for people that battered through their limits and drove them rapidly into insanity._

And Dean wasn’t a virgin when it came to torture. He spent thirty years as a test subject, laid open to the degenerate inner workings of a demon’s mind.

In all truthfulness, he could have handled the torment if he hadn’t had to imagine how Sammy would react to the knowledge that Dean wanted to fuck him. Naturally, because his life was frickin peachy and his luck was golden, he had a thousand variations of the exact shade of horror that would mar Sam’s face scorched into his retinas. Witnessed the back of Sam’s coat millions of times as his brother left him again and again.

It had only taken a few days in Hell before the demons extracted Dean’s innermost phobias and insecurities.

Then, they invented a game.

Every day, they would offer Dean’s mind a momentary respite, there would be a dream.

A dream—or a memory polished up so that precise details could be recalled exactly—so exquisitely delicate Dean could almost forget the gore, the shrieks at ear-splitting decibels.

The very first one had been Sam’s first steps. He remembered practicing with his precious, jelly-limbed baby brother for weeks; then one day, as Dean prepared Sam’s lunch his brother had tittered excitedly and to Dean’s amazement Sam toddled a few steps towards him with outstretched arms. Scooping up his Sammy, Dean swung him around, kissing his head intermittently telling Sam how proud he was and that he was such a good _smart_ little boy.

Dean had woken up the first time to the demons tearing baby Sam’s limbs from his body.

It just kept progressing. During the second month of the game, Dean began having the kind of dreams he had been repressing since puberty.

Sam heavenly, gloriously, lavishly spread out on some nondescript bedspread. Baby-fine chestnut hair spread like a halo, his eyes heavy-lidded and his mouth quirked with a teasing lilt. It only got worse when Dean took in the nakedness. Sam was like some priceless painting with his tanned limbs stretched at such an angle that Dean couldn’t miss the obvious arousal.

Sometimes Dean could just watch soaking up his fill without having to avert his gaze in shame. Occasionally, he could touch. The delicate sole of his brother’s foot, the sensitive underside of his arm, his silken thighs.

He couldn’t close his eyes when the demons raped his brother and he couldn’t stop his screaming even after they tore out his vocal cords.

And so it went, until his dreams were more like nightmares and waking or no all he could hear was Sam screaming for Dean to _stop, to quit being disgusting,_ that he would never love Dean because _Dean was worthless so worthless. Not good for anything._

On the arrival to the cabin, all Dean could hear were echoes of _worthless, useless, disgusting._ Grooming Sam had been so soothing with his brother trusting him and relying on Dean to take care of him that Dean couldn’t help but dredge up those dreams, that damn game. He just couldn’t let himself slip after all these years. Especially not when he just got Sam back from the cage and managed to get rid of robo Sam.

Pulling up to the place, Sam whistled appreciatively, “Dude, this place is awesome. Look, it has a lake and everything. We could probably go swimming at night.”

Dean’s own excitement swelled, the Hell memories recessing into the blacken corners of his mind, and mirrored Sam’s as his brother practically bounced in his seat. Sam’s wings struggled in their tape bonds as Sam craned his neck to take in the scenery.

“How on earth did you find this place on the spot like that?”

Dean shrugged noncommittally, “I’ve kinda had my eye on it, just didn’t have the right excuse.”

“And now you do—bird wings,” Sam cuts in his mouth turned up in a crooked grin of amusement. Dean nods in agreement. The road leading up the cabin is paved, Dean counts himself lucky, so he can park his baby in front of their place.

Quickly, he scans the immediate area before hustling Sam into the cabin; though it was the last in the row and it was about a five minute drive from their cabin to the neighbors. They weren’t in much danger of being spotted by a trespasser but still they weren’t completely isolated.

So, without too much horseplay, Sam and Dean lugged in the bags while keeping an eye on the storm clouds that were beginning to drift in. Sam tugged him inside and pulled him around the cabin. The front door opened into a high vaulted ceilinged great room with,

“Look, we have a T.V. Like an operational one,” Sam gestured at the thing gleefully because not only was it a TV it was a large flat screen.

“Course. We even have cable,” Dean grinned, inwardly proud of picking somewhere that Sam seemed to like so much.

They continued searching around Sam pointing out every modern appliance or technological device and then they stocked the fridge with all kinds of food including vegetables for Sam and several different brands of beers that Dean had been curious to try.

Sprinkling, the first few rain drops began dripping down sporadically and when everything was taken care of inside Dean leaned in the doorway taking in the darkening landscape.

His nails dug into his palms as lightning decorated the sky in nonsensical arcs and the flicks of pressure were barely enough to steady him. Tears wormed their way down his face in warm trails before he could halt their progress.

Each tract of wetness signified his body’s perfidy because he shouldn’t be upset right now, and in a manner of speaking he wasn’t. A little domestic side of him exulted at the opportunity to have a steady residence. Therefore, bygones should be bygones and he should be over it. I mean Hell didn’t treat him half as bad as it did Sam. But, he was the one who couldn’t even look at his brother without his gut clenching hotly because he’s just that screwed up to appreciate the mastery of Sam from his toes to his ridiculous hair.

Then, Sam’s at his side, one hand solidly on his shoulder and the tip of one wing grazing his back.

Dean doesn’t walk outside, so much as he falls and his body follows the forward momentum. Rain tastes different than the saltiness of tears on his tongue and he poses motionless under the rain shower content to let a current carry him away. But then his little brother is right behind him again.

“Dean,” he whispers soft, like his name is a secret just between the two of them, “We can fix this.”

It isn’t so hard to hide the tells, when hazel eyes aren’t piercing apart his soul. With his shaking hands behind his back, it’s easy for Dean to answer, “Ain’t nothing to fix Sammy. Everything’ll be fine,” despite the fact that there isn’t anything to repair the faulty wiring in his own head.

 Normally, he can tame his hunter instincts around his brother because it’s just easier to tell the difference of Sam’s tread versus some monster trying to eat him. But he’s so captured, submerged in the mire of eternally suppressed terror, when a hand curls in the meaty skin of his upper arm there isn’t any discerning involved just response.

His fist flies, primeval violence an outlet for the tension that has been progressively building in him, humming along fed by his adrenaline. The punch lands a little wide, but still clips Sam’s jaw with enough force to have the taller hunter cursing in surprise,

“The hell! What the fuck is wrong with you?” This time Sam gripped at Dean with both hands but held his body in such a way that could become defensive real damn fast if he sensed the need.

Dean complied, let Sam maneuver his body so that Sam could stare inquiringly down into his face.

There wasn’t a bruise yet, or Dean couldn’t see the beginning blossom of color through the rain, but assuredly he had marked Sam. Something clawed inside him, yearning, demanding to brush his fingers down that jawline. To trace the barely-there prickly stubble down to where the impact occurred, instead he shoved his hands in his jean pockets.

“Sorry, man, you spooked me and I have way too much energy right now,” a modicum of truth interspersed between his lies and Dean smiling ruefully at Sam but his face broadcasted his shame with guilty eyes cast down at the mud sloshing around over their boots.

Sam pushed verbally and with a shunt to Dean’s chest, “You knew I was there. What’s wrong? You’re not okay, so whatever it is we should talk about it. Especially if you are uncomfortable being around me.”

With a huff, Dean placed himself out of Sam’s reach because everything between them sung unresolved and for Dean it would be too easy to slip up or fall into bad habits. Provoking a fight was unwise.

“I’m not uncomfortable around you, Sasquatch. You just ninja-grabbed me and I’m too keyed up for that shit right now.”

“See, I don’t believe that. I don’t buy it. Cause I know you,” at Dean’s snort, Sam returned, “Yeah, asshole, I know you and something’s been eating at you. I just want to help.”

Tempting though it may be, Dean couldn’t tumble into that particular rabbit hole; otherwise he’d be spilling everything, all his dirty insides confessed.

Defensive, he emphasized, enunciating every syllable like Sam was a child, “I am fine. Drop it.”

Slithering past his defenses, quick as an eel, Sam weaseled back in his space again. At the last moment, Dean realized that Sam was coming with too much speed and not enough space to brake. Though, when Dean stumbled back to avoid the accident, Sam gripped his shirt and hauled him upright.

Triumph flashed outwardly but Sam’s facial muscles all pulled downwards in displeasure. A blistering, passionate sentiment ate wickedly in Dean’s gut at the misconstrued conclusion Sam derived from his own reactions.

“I’m not afraid of you, for God’s sake.”

And irrefutably, that was true.

Not when Sam resembled an overgrown drenched puppy. His wings fluffed up at the deluge of water and his hair stuck to his face in wet patches.  Sam remained the single-most important person in Dean’s life. His pride, joy, and reason to wake up in the morning no matter how fucked his life got.

“I would never be scared of you, Sam,” Dean admitted unrepentantly, earnest, open and magnificent in ways Sam couldn’t even begin to express.

“Then, what is it?” Sam pleaded but truthfully not expecting an answer.

A glance at the sky, unveiled, with stars glinting ubiquitous, and Dean murmured over the din of rainfall, “Hell. Sometimes it catches up with a guy, you know.”

Dean doesn’t know what he is expecting, maybe a manly hug or something of that nature. Even a few well-meaning words to soothe some of the ache away. What he didn’t foresee was Sam’s punch coming low at his stomach and he barely had the presence of mind to block the blow.

“What is this? I actually have a share and care moment with you and you attack me,” Dean asked incredulously.

“I’m giving you an outlet. Pain, that I can control, it helps focus me.”

“Kid, you’re therapy sucks. Sparring ain’t gonna do a damn thing to banish my hell memories. It wasn’t like that for me.”

Nevertheless, he had to give Sam props for his tenacity. Sam boxes at his head until finally the older hunter retaliated just to curtail the taunts. Mud slicked everything and they glided together in rhythmic ebb and tide until Sam hooked a leg behind Dean’s ankle and they tumbled down in a heap of overlong limbs.

The wings slapped distractingly in the muck and Dean redirected his efforts to pinning them down in order to avoid being whacked or suffocated.

“Dude, we could make good money if we filmed this. People love mud wrestling,” he panted while his muscles ached with the strain of trying to rend his oversized brother immobile.

There came a huffing sort of chuckle from slightly above his shoulder, but before he could correct his predicament Dean found himself hopelessly pinned by Sam.

“Say it,” Sam crowed joyously in his face but Dean couldn’t breathe, think, or say anything with the soaked full body press of his brother scattering his brain cells like marbles.

Immediately, Sam’s eyes shuttered in mute hurt, “’s the matter,” he breathed, “You don’t like touching me?”

“Nah, you’re fine gigantor. Now git off me. You’re crushing something vital.”

“Look, we can saw the bloody things off if that’s what it takes. I just don’t want things weird between us.”

Gripping Sam’s jaw with one hand, he buried his fingers in the slick softness of the left wing, and growled, “Don’t even think about it. They’re fucking beautiful, and apart of you. So we are damn well keeping them.”

Sam, for a moment, didn’t so much as twitch and Dean sighed pointedly, “so get your ass off of me. I’m dying under here.”

The rain made the first initial press of Sam’s lip taste blank, innocent before Dean could clearly define his brother’s spiciness. His head couldn’t compute the shifting of Sam’s train of thought and the pressure on his mouth and body disappeared almost simultaneously before he could even focus on the fact that his brother kissed him.

If he could, Dean would have sunk deeper into the sopping ground, let the earth consume him and absorb his flesh. But a hand shone out in the dark and he accepted the lifeline.

Collapsing into bed that night, freshly showered – thoughts still thoroughly disordered—Dean couldn’t help but curse the separate rooms.

By claiming the bedroom on the first floor, he limited his options for being able to hear Sam breathe as he fell asleep. Not that it hadn’t been Dean’s plan all along for Sam to have the loft upstairs for more space. This became especially practical now that Sam had a ginormous wingspan that required a substantial territory when he slept.

However, being near Sam while he sleeps is the one basic comfort Dean has typically been afforded in his lifetime and it makes him uneasy and unrestful now. Even on a mattress fitted with sheets of a decent thread count—he’s been domestic enough in his lifetime to enjoy the silken fabric against his skin and know the cause of the creature comfort—he can’t settle his mind enough to hurl himself into sleep.

Each time he closes his eyes, he imagines the pretty smack Sam’s mouth made as he pulled away. The smell of Sam’s girly shampoo clogs his sinuses with a phantom scent of spice. His nose tingles where it smashed against his brother for just that brief instant when Sam took something that Dean shouldn’t want to give.

Dean tortures himself, his gut twisted, conflicted because Sam kissed him but why? _Why?_

 

Two days. They’d been settled in the cabin for two days before Sam almost blew their cover.

A sudden rapping at their door set Dean on edge because no one they knew should have their address and anything that could track them down probably wouldn’t be heralding good news; opening the door, Dean didn’t have his gun drawn though it would take only a few seconds for him to pull it from his waistband.

With a quizzical frown, he surveyed the middle-aged woman on his porch.

“Well, hello there, hon. Hope I didn’t wake you.”

 Cocking an eyebrow, Dean replied, “Uhhh… of course not. I was already up making Sammy some breakfast. Kid eats like a horse you know.”

The lady fixed him with such an intense stare combined with a pasted white smile that it made Dean uncomfortable. “So is there anything I can help you with?” he questions awkwardly.

“Oh, of course, my name’s Pam. It’s nice to meet you,” which didn’t answer his question but she held out her hand clearly expecting his name in return. There was an internal debate before Dean went with the truth, “Dean”.

“Dean, it’s nice to finally meet you,” she continued to stall in his doorway with a patient smile, before she prompted, “May I come in?” Her voice twanged with the indulgent, cozy accent of a deeply Southern state and Dean figured she probably had some uprising-socialite, knows everyone in the nearest vicinity, kind of reason for this visit.

“You know, now’s not a great time. Sammy probably just got out of bed and his head isn’t where it should be until he’s gotten some caffeine into his system, so I’m sure you wouldn’t want to deal with a grumpy bed-head.”

Slapping on his own patented FBI-agent grin, he made to close the door but she sidestepped into the entrance where he couldn’t close anything without scraping her sandal-clad foot.

“I’ll only stay a couple minutes,” she wheedled resolutely. Besides shoving Pam on her ass out the door, Dean’s options were fairly limited so with a silent plea for Sam to stay put upstairs, he grudgingly opened the door wide enough so that Pam could finish her intrusion into the cabin.

“Oh, this place is just lovely. I bet your son just loves having so much space to romp about.”

Immediately, she walks across the living room to lean against the glass of their picture window which lit up the room with the jaunty light of the morning and twinkled with reflections from the lake. Dean ground his teeth together because even from this distance he could spot the greasy imprint her body was leaving on his window.

She turned, a self-conscious flush pinking her neck and cheeks, “I’m sorry about the window, I just had to admire this view. You picked out an excellent piece of property, Dean.”

Her maniacal neighbor-friendly mega-wattage peeled into something more candid and pleasant. Yet, a predatory edge creeped into her countenance as she surveyed him in a molasses speed appraisal. With an air of defiance, he flops onto the couch with a pointed glance at the armchair.

Bypassing the warming in his mannerisms, she perches herself, with a dainty cross of her legs at the ankles, on the cushion next to him which is pretty damn invasive.

Then all of a sudden it comes to him, “Son?” He didn’t mean to come across obtuse and he doesn’t intend to glance over, but he does, finding Pam studying his face as if it held the secrets to the universe.

She responds, “You mentioned a Sam. Your son, I’m presuming.”

In a maneuver sociably calculating, she pats his knee before sliding her hand up the inseams of his jeans skimming pearly pink nails over the skin bared by the holes in his pants. Granted, her hands are freaky smooth like baby oiled skin, but her forwardness had him shifting uncomfortably in his seat.

Helplessly, he runs his mouth, “Ummm, yeah no. Sam isn’t a child. He’s a grown man,”

Pam cocks one delicate eyebrow, still not moving her hand which steadily stroked his tense thigh, but before he can explain himself further he catches the distinct creaking of the wooden stairs that no one but his brother could be descending.

He hopped up like a maniac but Sam had already emerged from around the corner though sans the wings. Cocking his head in confusion Dean gestured agitatedly at Sam, unmindful of their guest before Pam cleared her throat meaningfully.

“Look lady,” he barked, his tone reminiscent of John’s when his father reached the end of his patience, but at a slight glower from Sam, Dean toned it down,

“Let me get you something to drink. Sammy, come help me.”

As they bustled into the kitchen, both almost bowled each other with questions but Dean felt that his took precedence.

“Where are they?” he mimed while pushing at Sam to make sure the kid hadn’t followed up on his threat to saw them off. 

“Shhhh, Dean, it’s fine. They’re here, you just can’t see them,” but Sam’s conciliating words only riled Dean up further.

“Whaddya mean? What did you do with them?”

Sam had the grace to look sheepish, “I just heard the door open and knew something was up. I kinda got pissed that I couldn’t be a part of what was going on and I wished they would go away and poof I couldn’t see them anymore.”

“So you’re bird wings have a magic invisibility cloak,” there wasn’t any sarcasm, skepticism definitely but that was to be expected with all the new developments.

“Something like that, sure. Now who is she? What does she want?”

“I don’t know, some pushy neighbor or something. Wants to meet and greet I guess,” Sam didn’t appear wholly satisfied but inevitably they would return to this conversation, so Dean didn’t feel bad for leaving it alone now; and Dean’s heart resumed beating now that the crisis had been circumvented or so he thought.

When they emerged from the kitchen Cokes in hand, Pam rose swiftly from the couch stretching her hand out, “You must be Sam.”

For a moment, he didn’t think that Sam would shake her hand—the same one that had invited itself to copping a feel of Dean’s leg—because his brother looked as if he would much rather chew off her arm than exchange niceties. Then, the arch left his posture leaving him much more approachable and friendly.

Handing off her drink, he shook hands and settled down on the couch. Dean planned on sitting on the opposite side of the same couch, so as not to give Pam the wrong idea, but Sam gripped his wrist and drew him down practically in his lap. Quirking an eyebrow, he hissed, “Watch it. You’ll damage the goods.”

Yet, it did leave Pam in the armchair and Dean distinctly felt that they were suddenly in an inquisition.

“So, to what do we owe the pleasure?” But Sam bit out the word “pleasure” demonstrating he favored her less and less and caused Dean to wonder what his brother had been privy to that lead to this level of dislike.

Tilting her head, even as her bangs remained fixed firmly in place oddly enough, Pam scrunched her nose and then broke out laughing as if Sam told the funniest joke of all time.

Then Dean flew forward with the force of a phantom wing banging into him in surprise. Dean managed to mask his grunt with a fake round of coughs.

“Oh, honey,” Pam gasped out, “You’re both acting like I’m about to break out the torture instruments and start pulling teeth out.”

Sam tried to crack a smile, except he didn’t even have to imagine that particular terror when he had actually been strapped to his brother while some crazy ancient deity attempted to pull Dean’s tooth with a sacrificial torture device.

“You really don’t get out and meet the neighbors, do you?” She continued.

“Pam, you have no idea,” Dean responded but his voice held genuine amusement.

“You mean no one’s ever brought you a welcome to the neighborhood pie,” she teased her brown eyes melting, glimmering with mischief.

“People bring pie,” Dean sat up, paying much more attention, “that’s so nice of them. How do we get the pie?” Though Sam tossed his head, brow drawn equally in bemused humor and exasperation, Pam took Dean’s statement, rolling it around in her head gleeful now at having pinpointed a weakness.

“Do you love pie, sweetie?”

Despite Sam’s solid arm bracketing his possessively, Dean cranked up his level of smarminess, “Sweetheart, I love me some pie,” he flourished his statement with an overdramatic wink but his undeniable charisma underlined his overt splendor.

“Well then you’ve got to come to dinner. See if my cherry pie ranks with some of the others you’ve had.”

“We will most definitely take you up on that offer.” Pam took the opportunity to lean forward gracing both hunters with a prolonged peek at her generous chest and placed her hand once again on Dean’s knee.

                      _Bang!_

Saboteur, obviously Sam wanted to blow their cover. Otherwise their antique, astonishingly-solid wooden coffee table would still be intact; not spilt into pieces after Sam slammed his wrist down on it, irrefutably a feat no human could accomplish. I mean they had both tried to move the behemoth when they first moved in and Dean guessed that the table weighed at least three hundred and fifty pounds. 

Also, the resulting clamor, combined with the tinkle of the glass inlay collapsing and diamonding out in splintered shards onto the hardwood floors, must have startled his wings because they knocked over a lamp across the room and bumped against the T.V, which thankfully did not succumb to the force of the blow.

Remarkably, Pam didn’t have the freak out that objects moving on their own and inhuman strength typically warranted, rather she just nodded at Sam and said, “Better watch your own strength there. Wouldn’t want to hurt somebody.”

To Dean, she added questionably with a furrowed brow, “And if there is anything I can do to help, you just let me know.” The implications in her statement rattled oddly in his mind, but for the moment he forwent the questions he wanted to ask just grateful that they didn’t have a hysterical woman to deal with.

It was Sam however that cut in, “We, uh, we will. Thanks.” He also stood up, out of the mess, signifying the conclusion of the visit. Dean had the foresight to exchange phone numbers and despite the table incident Pam still made him promise they would both come to dinner next week.

As soon as Pam’s floral-print clad back disappeared into a little red Toyota, Dean commenced his freak out moment, “Sam…. Just what? What happened back there?”

Rubbing agitated hands through his hair, Sam’s mouth curved down in a slight pout that quickly morphed into a frustrated grimace as he gritted it out, “It’s just Pam,”

Dean’s breath gusted out in a pleased sigh, “Older women make me lose my head too. I mean they are freaking awesome, gotta love ‘em.”

His brother though, from where he was standing with his arms crossed among his self-created wreckage of the coffee, didn’t agree or disagree. Unbidden, Dean admired how the fabric of Sam’s flannel shirt tugged across his shoulders muscles lovingly shielding the skin from view but then wonders absently how Sam’s wearing the thing at all. He makes a note to ask at some point in the future.

“She’s most likely married, has a family,” Sam spoke, his vocalization carrying across the room.

Dean couldn’t make logical sense the conversation was taking though, “So?” he posed challengingly, “What’s that got to do with me? What does that have to do with anything? With you?”

“Nothing asshole, just that she was throwing herself at you and you weren’t doing anything to dissuade her.”

“You jealous?” Initially, Dean intended for the words to spring free with a mocking edge thrown behind the statement but instead he sounded distinctly curious because if Sam was jealous it would explain a lot and nothing at all. Intuitively he sensed something like envy lurking in Sam’s attitude, his posture.

In lieu of answering any of Dean’s questions, Sam asked, “Will you groom them again?” with an indicative shift to signify his wings.

One hell of a diversionary tactic, Dean thought to himself as his little brother beseeched him with infallible Sam Winchester puppy dog eyes. With a generous nod and a gesture from Dean, they ignored the mess and tromped up to Sam’s room.

His brother stripped himself obediently with graceful ease, long lean fingers slipping buttons out of button holes; wriggling out of tee-shirts and his emerging chest baring the anti-possession tattoo that shamelessly asserted yet another bond between them.

After an indecisive moment, Sam also shrugged out of his jeans the denim puddling on the floor and instantaneously Dean imagines Sam’s pants on the floor scattered about for a completely different reason.

Oppressively, he chokes on the sense impression of events barreling his way that are outside his control to alter or divert.

“So, you gonna unveil the things or not?”

Closing his eyes, it took about a minute of concentrated effort before his wings clapped into existence with a gush of wind that tugged at Dean’s shirt hem. He understood why they needed grooming, the older feathers were falling out all over the place and a majority of the feathers had a dusty coating which dulled their otherworldly brunet color.

As Dean ran his fingers over the near most wing, a cluster of older feathers leeched off into his hands.

“Hey, does that hurt to lose these?” he probed, stilling his motions.

At an emphatic shake of his brother’s head, Dean laid Sam down and began to work starting at the tips of the starch outer feathers rimmed with gold and working his way inwards. As he plucked, Dean began explaining the basic anatomy of the wings and their functions.

Even though Sam wasn’t extremely charmed by the idea of sharing common genes with the avian species, he took genuine interest in the bird books Dean had bought to properly take care of his wings. He eventually began asking more questions and memorizing the structure of his primary and secondary feathers and flexing them unconsciously.

However, they still couldn’t explain why his wings were so sensitive.

“I mean when they brush up against anything else it doesn’t bother me, but if you touch them it’s,” Sam paused mid-hypothesis as he searched for the right phrase.

“Orgasm-worthy” Dean finished sounding decidedly distracted.

Sam chances a look over his shoulder, taking in Dean’s flushed face with sweat beginning a trek down his temple because he’s up to his elbows in feathers but with enough presence of mind to yank Sam’s chain.

Sometime around the point when he’s realigning the remaining plumage, Sam accidentally releases a drawn-out groan as Dean battled with a gnarled patch of non-cooperating down near the joints where his wings taper into the skin of his back.

Dean doesn’t grace the noise with any undue attention, thank goodness; but a few seconds later he’s cursing, “Son of a bitch!” in the throaty timber indicating an unanticipated sensation. The he adds, “I think I made your wings bleed or something.”

His older brother only tolerated a few seconds of mumbling before he heaved Sam out of his face-first view of the pillion and into a seated position.

Sam balefully repeated his sentence while his wings crowded around Dean like puppies eager for his attention, “Didn’t you say they produced their own oil last time you did this.”

Consolingly, Dean rubbed along the primary feathers causing Sam to lose his breath and whimper at the teasing touch.

“Yeah, but it wasn’t this much before. I mean dude, you’re drenched right now.”

No conscious decision making occurred on Sam’s part when he murmured, “Did you get me all wet like a girl, Dean?” He peeked up shyly through his bangs as Dean hissed through his teeth, “Jesus, kid. C’mon, cut it out.”

 But Sam wasn’t listening, couldn’t think with his upstairs brain. Not when his brother’s hands are still on him, idly musing up one section of feathers only to smooth the quills down again.

“I’m freaking horny,” Sam sighs out and a groan erupts from Dean’s throat.  

“Just lay back down okay. I’ll finish and you can take care of yourself.”

Compliant, pliable as clay, Sam stretches out once again but the instant Dean touches his wings with intent, he begins giving orders. As the moments creeped past, ticking so sluggishly, the atmosphere became more and more sexually charged and Dean couldn’t confess to anything except being hopelessly turned on by Sam’s wrecked gasps of “Right there” or “touch me there” or Dean’s personal favorite “pull it harder” and the sound that tore out of Sam’s throat whenever Dean followed an order precisely echoed in the room and tugged at Dean’s morality because it should not be him dragging noises like that out of his brother.

In the middle of Dean yanking viciously at feathers that were already to his knowledge straightened out perfectly just to pull another delicious gasp and cry from Sam, Castiel appeared in Sam’s room taking in the scene with a cocked head and mystified expression.

“Hello, Dean, Sam,” he pronounced his presence dousing the lust in Dean’s body as if the angel had tossed a bucket of ice water on him.

As to be expected, there is considerable discomfort in having a grown man suddenly manifest himself in one’s personal space as Cas is prone to do; Dean even mentally pats himself on the back for managing not to yell. It’s not that Dean even minds having Cas in his face because there are worse things to look at. The sudden inexplicableness of it all is what bothers him.

Dean might not have yelled, but Sam let loose one hell of a growl. Like bare your teeth like a dog protecting my territory kind of noise.

Cas though held his hands up in an apologetic signal, “I’m sorry. I did not intend to interrupt your mating. Please forgive me, I will return when you are decent.” Characteristically, Cas vanished before the boys had time to even formulate a response or farewell.

Dean extracted himself from the tangle of all six of Sam’s limbs and plopped onto the desk chair in the corner of the room.

“What the hell, Sam? I thought it was understood that growling at a friend is not nice. And did he say mating? Because I’m pretty sure, he said mating.”

Sam finally rolled onto his back, his wings drooping off either side of the bed lying limp like the flag of a defeated enemy.

“Dean,” he drew out the word in a way that Dean recognized from experience would proceed him trying to start a conversation about subjects that Dean resolutely intended to repress. Like how that grooming session was rapidly evolving into something incestuous.

“We need to call Cas back and straighten out the whole mating business.” Though Sam didn’t verbally agree, neither did he veto the idea so Dean prayed to Cas.

During the second appearance of the angel, Sam and Dean were both fully dressed and located at opposite ends of Sam’s room—Dean had his arms folded across his chest, in a vain effort to cover the oil stains on his shirt; oil that Sam leaks when he’s being groomed that smells musky, intoxicating and makes Dean want to bury his face in the densest portion of Sam’s wing to suffocate in the naked smell of his brother.

Mercifully, Cas reappeared unflappable, face casually scrubbed blank as if this were a normal day.

“Are you two finished? I didn’t want you to stop on my behalf.”

“That’s why we called you again. We need some explanation,” as Dean finished with Sam relaxing in his periphery, the situation adopted a semblance of normalcy.

“An explanation for what?” Cas queried and Sam chuckles embarrassedly under his breath.

Nonetheless Dean forges ahead, “You though we were uh…. mating, I guess.”

Castiel began nodding, “Of course. You were grooming Sam’s wings, which for an angel grooming is an act of utmost intimacy. The act is usually shared only between family and after an angel reaches maturity, then the mate.”

“So, it’s like,” Dean hesitated before Cas completed his sentence, “it is most similar to sexual intercourse between two spouses, yes. It demonstrates a profound bond of trust and love.”

Finally, after muttering about needing a drink, Dean strode out of the room.

Cas peered at Sam in the clinical, unreserved curiosity of a doctor and Sam barely restrained the urge to draw his wings around himself protectively.

“Sam, when did you grow angel wings?”

“Dean says they’re bird wings,” Sam insists stubbornly. 

Cas shakes his head, “I don’t think so. Admittedly, the shape in which they manifested themselves is different than an angel’s, it is seraphim in nature. They aren’t bird wings.”

 

The light in the kitchen burned over bright casting an artificial hue on all the appliances and the oil on Dean’s hands glinted obscenely while he steadily poured his whiskey into a tumbler.

Liquor slid down his throat in a fiery guilty deluge but for once he had sprung for a top-shelf brand so he could appreciate the taste. Over his own hefty gulps, scraps of conversation waffled into the kitchen but Dean didn’t strain his ears to pick up the conversation because there is no way it was anything but awkward.

The elder brother portion of his psyche and his conscience couldn’t completely assent to leaving Sam to explain the situation to Cas. But, either way Dean wouldn’t be a decent source of help anyway, as he didn’t fully comprehend the situation himself.

Dean laid blame entirely on the wings, those damnable creations. Needlessly, they complicated an operation that the Winchesters had developed over a lifetime.

“Take care of Sammy” vocalized by John infinitely, replayed itself in Dean’s head eternally, his own personal mantra.

Sam got hurt on a hunt; Dean’s got to take care of Sammy.

Broken heart, Take care of Sammy.

No soul, Take care of Sammy.

Trauma caused by Hell, Take care of Sammy.

And on and on and on.

Until, something so simple like grooming a set of feathers really shouldn’t be difficult; except how Dean lusting after his little brother isn’t taking care of Sammy.

These wings have created a tension between them that’s vining in the crevices of their life and multiplying insidiously during the grooming sessions. Dean knows it’s only a matter of time before something—someone—snaps. And Dean can’t do it. Couldn’t face his own reflection in the mirror if he fucks Sammy up enough to think that anything incestuous between them is okay.

John’s words echo fitfully in his head, “Take care of Sammy.”

A muffled whump comes from upstairs and Dean downs the last dregs of his drink in a quick swallow before ascending the steps. He pushes open Sam’s closed door and then pauses in the threshold gathering his wits about him. Sam’s perched on the bed his face boyishly pleased and his wings whistling about, the feathers catching the afternoon rays and Dean couldn’t even name half the shades he could pinpoint in Sam’s wings.

For a moment, Sam didn’t resemble anything human and the label flitting on the tip of Dean’s tongue was angel.

Not the fluffy douchebags that currently occupied Heaven, but the human perception of an angel. A being of innocence, wisdom, an embodiment of perfection.

Though Dean also halted, feet cemented to the floor, as he stared at Castiel’s wings which were on display, the black feathers whipping about purposefully with an air of lethal promises. Both Sam and Cas became aware of his presence at the same time and one of Sam’s hands wave welcoming. Dean wades further into the room, but his head ducks every few seconds because he doesn’t feel _worthy_ to be here.

“Dean,” and like in the rain Sam whispers his name, private and Dean can’t help but raise his eyes to his brother. Catching Sam’s eye for long enough to reassure himself against that it is okay to be here, to have this, to be one of the angels.

Then Sam continues normally, bantering to calm the atmosphere, “There aren’t bird wings, man. I’m part-angel, obviously.”

“Sure and I’m the queen of England. Sam you can’t just grow angel wings, dude,” Dean quipped back.

“And bird wings make so much more sense,” Sam asked sarcastically.

Cas cut them off before they got any further into the discussion, turning to Dean he said, “If you wish to properly groom Sam you have to pay special attention to his oil glands, they can easily become blogged with excess oil.”

Dean didn’t know where that tidbit of advice came from, but he rolled with the topic change, “Where are these gland-things?” He questions, already petting the edge of Sam’s wings but under the guidance of Cas’ hands he fingered lightly along the ridges of Sam’s spine. As his gingers rub over twin knots at the base of Sam’s back, his brother screams an inhuman yell and Cas immediately flies to the other side of the room.

Dean also takes a few steps back, feeling as though he’s been scalded, “What? What happened” What did I do?”

Sam pulled himself together enough to shrug his shoulders, “I don’t know. It’s so damn sensitive there, but not in a bad way.”

“Forgive my mistake,” Cas sighs his wings hunching over into himself broadcasting his own disappointment in himself, “Oil glands are quite sensitive and the largest erogenous zone for an angel. Dean you must be very careful when touching them,” he cleared his throat self-consciously, “And now, I uh, I have business to attend to, but I trust you two to find what works the best for Sam.”

He left suddenly, leaving Dean to gape at Sam, “Erro-what?”

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sunshine ruptured through the veil of clouds that had taken up residence over their cabin, smothering the scenery in an overcast haze; the light didn’t disturb Sam or Dean until around midday when it became impossible to evade the glare of daylight filtering in their rooms and continue sleeping.

Sam didn’t even have to twist Dean’s arm about going swimming in the lake. They splashed into the lake only minutes after waking up, forgoing both breakfast and coffee and the water lapped coyly at their legs.

“We haven’t done this in forever,” Sam said dreamily, floating on his back. He had vanished his wings again so they could swim in the public lake in broad daylight but if Dean looked hard enough he could detect the ripples the wings were creating as they splashed around. Briefly, he considered grabbing one to freak out Sam, who had flipped onto his belly to blissfully paddle along in the water, but discarded the idea in favor for trying to dunk his brother under the water.

The water hadn’t reached past Dean’s chest yet, tiny, chilly undulations of the water creating goosebumps wherever his body wasn’t submerged, and it wouldn’t be so difficult to get Sam’s feet out from under him since Dean was standing flatfooted. And Dean’s plan totally would have worked but Sam wasn’t easy to sneak up on even with the water softly muffling sounds like wool in ears.

But, once Sam became cognizant he was being hunted the game complicated immensely because now Dean couldn’t let himself be dunked. Sam’s a smug bastard whenever he beats Dean at anything, so that just wasn’t happening today.

Except that he left his back unprotected for too long and Sam made use of the moment afforded to lunge at the opening; for a few alarming seconds of grappling, Dean thought Sam would actually get him in the water so he fought dirty. Estimating as best as he could, he swung his hands where he thought Sam’s wings would be and stroked down in a rough petting motion.

In their current position, with Sam plastered to his back, Dean couldn’t see his brother but could hear the air hissing through Sam’s teeth as he choked back the groan that clogged his throat. Praying that he hadn’t actually hurt Sam, Dean capitalized on Sam’s loose arms on his torso to kick away; he only made it a few lengths away before a hand wrapped around his ankle and drug him backwards.

Allowing his limbs to grow lax when Sam reeled him closer, because Sam definitely became a prissy bitch when their roughhousing became too violent and he actually got hurt, Dean resigned himself to defeat in order to pacify his brother.

But as Sam tugged him closer, right against his chest with sleekly wet muscles—his expressive, wild grin mirroring the predatory glee in his eyes and Dean knew they were seconds away from a different sort of game.

It was only logical for him to splash Sam in the face.

Which prompted an all-out splashing war.

They horsed around until hunger finally did them in and the rumbling of their stomachs wouldn’t subside.

They were settled on their back porch in lounge chairs leeching the warmth the sun provided when Dean’s cellphone rang. He thoroughly intended to ignore it if he didn’t know the number, but when Pam’s name flashed on the display screen his mind jumped immediately to pie. Flipping the phone open, he answered,

“Hey, neighbor.”

“Dean, are you by yourself?” Pam’s voice trickled through the speakers.

“Ummm…. Not at the moment. Why? Is something wrong?” Baffled, Dean couldn’t imagine what his face revealed, but when Sam sat up to give him a questioning look Dean just shook his head minutely.

“I need you to be somewhere private,” Pam insisted and with a gentle pat on Sam’s shoulder, Dean walked inside the cabin.

“Alright, I’m in my room by myself. You gonna tell me what’s going on?”

“Alright good, you follow directions like a good solider should,” Pam sounded entirely too pleased with herself, “Listen to me very carefully, Dean. Your brother is a monster and you being a Winchester with all your rumored skills, I’m assuming you already know that,” and the woman on the other end of the phone line lost all traces of geniality.

 “The hell are you smoking? You want me to call the cops on you,” the impassive steel in his voice masked the trepidation pirouetting in his chest.

 “Don’t play stupid with me. You’re a hunter, born and raised. Salt lines gave you away, sweetheart plus you’re a Winchester so you know what you’re doing. Too bad your decision making is skewed,” Pam’s voice mused over the phone, “What would your Daddy think about you allowing Sam to live when he’s not even human?”

 “Listen here bitch, you don’t know shit about me and you don’t know shirt about my family. So you better start spilling the beans and tell me what the hell this is all about, before I hunt you down myself.”

“Oh, you think you’re so scary. Sugar, I’ve been hunting longer than you’ve been alive,” but at Dean’s silence she continued, “You’re going to tell your brother that my car broke down and that you are going to help me fix it. Then you’re going to drive down about ten miles south of where you are and someone will pick you up.”

Dean snorted into the phone, “In your motherfucking dreams.”

“I have your angel,” the simplicity of Pam’s sentence confused him, “the pretty one in the trench coat. Bluest eyes I’ve ever seen, I might keep him as a pet once I’m finished with him.”

He fought the urge to retch as bile fought its way up into his mouth, but Pam obviously wasn’t finished,

“We have the angel’s blade so Sam doesn’t stand a chance, vile little spawn of Lucifer. We will kill him and I’ll make you watch as we cut out Sam’s heart and stab the angel. They’ll be dead and you’ll be alone with the knowledge that it is your fault,” Dean’s head spun with the implications and the allegations.  

He’s hoarse when he responds several heartbeats later, “I’ll be there,” and hangs up.

In the middle of him throwing off his sweat pants and shrugging on a pair of jeans, he gets a text.

Plain text staring starkly at him,  **_No weapons._**

A pervading impression of nakedness overcame Dean as he tossed his gun onto his bed and slid other weapons from their concealed holsters.

Descending the stairs, he found Sam waiting for him, spine tense and his wings holding themselves erect up above his head. Through enough experience, Dean recognized the necessity to initiate the conversation than to let Sam begin interrogating him.

            “I’ve uh, got to help Pam out. Car troubles,” Sam’s brow furrowed at Dean’s words, but Dean clapped him on the back reassuringly. “I’ll be home soon.”

            The sight of the front door had Dean dragging his feet— even though the urgency to rescue Cas had his adrenaline spiking— because Sam’s safety became even more uncertain the further Dean moved from his brother.

            “Everything’s fine, right?” and Sam doesn’t physically restrain him but Dean paused anyways.

            “C’mere,” he gestures and then Sam is in his space so close they are practically sharing oxygen. Sliding his hand up the curve of Sam’s jaw, he massages the silky strands of hair at the base of Sam’s neck, “Be careful, Sammy. Take care of yourself.” The wings floated down fashioning a warm, chocolatey feather-shield around both of them and Sam fisted a hand in Dean’s shirt protectively. Without an exchange of words, Sam knew Dean was in trouble.

            The pressure on his lips is sudden and blissful as Sam captures his mouth in a lingering kiss. He whispers _You too_  against the satiny plushness of Dean’s mouth and then adds _I love you, De._

            Dean can’t help but lay a final kiss on the corner of Sam mouth before he turns and walks out the door.

            Restlessness doesn’t suit Sam in any situation. But, this situation amplifies his uneasiness, disquiet pooling in his skull because what is happening with Dean is unequivocally associated with Pam. 

            He found himself pacing through the downstairs, depositing mud onto the floor from his boots, as he waited for _something_ to happen.

            Nonetheless, not a peep of action squeaked through for another two hours until two men crashed their way through the front door. Conveniently, Sam had been practicing on vanishing his wings and now could flash them away with just an artless thought. Therefore, the wings were gone by the time the men made their way into the kitchen where Sam was finishing off the rest of Dean’s expensive whiskey.

            His nerves were relatively calm when the brutes swung themselves into view; his hands held themselves stock still as he washed out the glass and set in on the proper shelf. Turning to face them, he held his body in a deceptively conciliatory manner despite every muscle brawling for violence.

            One of the guys, a blond mammoth of a man, gestured at Sam, “I take it, you’re the littlest Winchester,” and the other one couldn’t restrain a snicker at what obviously had been a lame attempt a joke.

At Sam’s curt nod, the man continued, the rumbling resonance of his voice as booming as a thunder clap in a summer storm, “You’re coming with us.”

“And if I don’t…” Sam asserted audaciously though with the conspicuous absence burning at his side where Dean should be posing threateningly and making smart-ass comments, it didn’t take too much of a mental leap to understand where this was leading.

“You’re pretty fond of that brother of yours, I’m told. It’d be a damn shame for something to happen to him,” the blond threw a lecherous smirk over his shoulder at his partner.

His throat seized as the illumination that he had been praying for had finally been delivered. Granted, Sam was only decoding minor efforts in Pam’s ultimate scheme but he was quickly sensing a strand of logic.

 “You’re the bastards that took him,” he stated and at their nods, he grinned feral lips stretched over miles of teeth, “Good, then I won’t feel bad when I kill you.”

The blond though, Sam determined that he was the leader of the duo, shook his finger in mock disappointment, “Hey, now, violence won’t solve anything. Sure, you could shoot us now, but then you’ve pissed away your chance to get Dean back.”

At Sam’s skeptical stare, the man held his hands up, “Go ahead and kill us. By the time you find your brother, he’ll be dead. It’s your choice.”

But there wasn’t a choice, not really, so Sam shrugged, “I’ll come with you.” He allowed them to bind his hands with knots that he isn’t entirely certain he could slip, but they don’t bother blindfolding him just grip his biceps in a vise-like pressure and lead him out the door.

The ride doesn’t take as long as Sam expects; he’s content to space out while gazing at the luscious green scenery, perpetually pressing and creeping into the road, flashing past, except that he isn’t really content he’s trying to remain sane long enough to get Dean back. It’s not even twenty minutes before the car is turning onto a dirt lane lined with evergreens stretching impossibly high towards the sun like a lover’s hand stuck carelessly out.

Walking, captors in tow, up to the house, he willed his mind into going blank rather than imaging what could be waiting for him inside. The starkly pure white paint of the house was offset by a forest green trim and the undeniably prettiness of it all turned Sam’s stomach. Its nauseating loveliness radiated outwards into the neatly kept yard and the flowers delicately poised in the flower beds.

On the porch, Pam was seated self-assuredly in a suspended porch-swing: one hand wrapped around a glass fogged by condensation and the other resting lightly in Dean’s hair. His brother sprawled loosely on the ground, and if not for the gag in his mouth Sam would have said he was having the time of his life. As it was, Dean clearly was being held against his will and was being dangled in front of Sam.

And it was too much, Sam’s control was shot. His wings unfurled with a prominent snap automatically skirting above himself in what he assumed to be a threatening display. He tore through the rope keeping his hands ensnared like crepe paper.

His voice didn’t sound like it belonged to him as he growled, “Don’t you dare fucking touch him.”

Metal flashed displaced in the afternoon haze as Pam held a gun to Dean’s head, “Yeah, what are you going to do?” and that sweet Southern drawl, slippery as syrup made him want to slice her throat, snip vocal cords easy as any surgeon.  “You come any closer and I blow his brains out. You want to see the pretty insides of his head? Make another move.”

Her henchmen breathed their approval, obnoxiously through their noses in gigantic snorting puffs.

Dean’s muffled noises through his gag drew Sam’s attention though and he recognized the signal there. Sam needed to cool it. It took four measured breaths before his wings blinked out of sight again….

But, his brother still struggled oblivious to the indifferent muzzle shoved against his skull.  

“Dean,” he spit out, wary but relatively confident Pam wouldn’t shoot, and his brother sagged against the wooden swing. “What do you want from us?” he addresses her and catches her appraising him without narrowed eyes.

“That’s a fun party trick you got there. How long have you had them?” She gestures wildly over him in an encompassed movement intended to signify the wings but her composed demeanor reveals her.

“You’re a hunter, aren’t you? You and the family,” he jerks his hand at the men behind him.

She nods, “My husband and his family. My family. My boys: Caleb and Kyle. ”

“You brought me here to put me down,” Sam guesses indifferently but Dean snarls wordlessly.

Another searching stare before she replies, “It certainly wouldn’t be unjustified, now would it. How many hunters have lost their lives trying to do that very thing? Regardless of what you tell yourself, you’re less human than monster and that’s before you became a freak of nature,” and that _hurt_.

Stung like nothing Sam could imagine even coming from such an unsavory source, but truth lurked in her statement. Enough that Sam felt the blacken sludge of his guilt dreg itself up from his mind.

But she continued, heedless of the clamor coming from Dean, “But, right now, I could use your help actually.”

“This is one hell of a way to ask. You know I might have said yes if you hadn’t taken him,” and even if that is a lie, Sam hadn’t been fond of her even before he knew she was a manipulative bitch who kidnapped his brother and utilized the chance to paw at him, he said it letting a faux contriteness color his sentence.

“Might have, Sam,” she said, “You might have considered this job if you weren’t on a vacation and you weren’t _too_ busy with some other job to come up here. But see I can’t settled with a might have, I needed help. Your help….”

“Why me, huh? I thought I was a monster, what do you need with me?” Sam cut in, his questions stacking up in his mind, overflowing.

 “I did my homework. You’re supposed to be the best.”

“Me? Who’s been blowing smoke up your ass? Because if you’re looking for the best hunter, you screwed up. You tied the wrong guy up. I’m not the best nor will I ever be, not as long as Dean’s around. You needed him.”

“Maybe,” Pam mused but shrugged, “It doesn’t matter anymore though, does it? Because you’ve gone and grown yourself a pair of wings. And that’s not it, is it?”

The sun beat on Sam, distantly he felt sweat begin to roll down his face, his neck, and back, “No. It isn’t. But how would you know?”

“Kyle, honey, you mind bringing our other friend outside,” the man strode purposefully inside and Sam finally made sense of who was who: the blond must be Caleb and his brother was Kyle.

Didn’t even take a minute before Kyle tugged out a beaten, bloodied Castiel. Sam exhaled through his nose as he surveyed the damage done to their friend, but withheld any queries into if Cas was okay. Kyle threw Cas onto the ground near Dean, but Pam gripped the trench coat and pulled him onto the seat.

Sam didn’t understand why Cas stayed when he could have flown away because injured or not, he’s still an angel.

Pam prompted with a rough squeeze to the angel’s jaw, “Why don’t you tell Sam what you told me? Starting with his purposed abilities.”

Despite his trodden outward appearance, Castiel’s distinct style of speaking remained neutral betraying no signs of pain, “Obviously the wings are powerful and he’s managed a good level of control over them. Managing to exist with them both in a corporal form and in an ethereal plane. Also, his strength will have increased tremendously, as displayed by his breaking the table. Also, his perceptions and his senses abilities will increase but more gradually. And I assume he can fly.” 

Both Dean and Sam cast a look at each other that clearly broadcasted _What the hell?_

“Now Cas, tell us why you think Sam has these abilities?” Pam pressed gently.

“Because…,” he paused, “I think this all manifested because he drank Lucifer’s blood in Hell.”

            Sam doesn’t remember the vomiting or passing out, can’t process or feel anything. His mind screeches in a roaring cacophony but Cas’s words replay again and again until something—if he labels it a memory, he must acknowledge that it is reality—peels itself from a dark recess. There’s blood, a steady stream of it on his tongue, in his throat, scorching his stomach, and it’s too much, laden with agony and pleasure so excruciating everything blacks out again.

            Consciousness looms in front of him and he could easily return to it by reaching, stretching, meeting that light he can just barely see. Occasionally a voice will worm its way down to him telling him to come back, that he has to come back, he’s got to do the right thing. But he pushes that disembodied voice back where it belongs and curls in the dark a little while longer.

*******

            Finally, Sam wakes up. His mouth feels full of cotton so he drinks the glass of water sitting next to him and then there’s a depression on the bed and Pam’s telling him, _It’s time to work._ But Sam hears Dean’s voice instead since it makes more sense when Dean’s giving the order so he asks the questions then takes the proffered laptop and he does what he knows.

*******

            Pam narrates as Sam works and if he changes the voice to make the pitch and cadence of Dean’s voice it almost feels like a real case. She tells him about the two girls, fifteen and eighteen, _her daughters who have been missing for almost a year. It isn’t really a secret that they are a hunting family and they have ganked plenty of monsters in their career so it could be anything wanting vengeance. But there just aren’t the regular signs and the whole family has had their nose to the ground in hopes of picking up something,_ anything _that could help them get their girls back. They just want their girls back and their family whole again._

            Honestly, it doesn’t even take Sam a whole night before he gets an idea of what happened. He spends the hours before dawn staring at the ceiling, tracking the spinning of the fan, and trying to shove the broken fragments of himself together into something that looks cohesive.   

            But every time he approaches something that looks like a sane Sam Winchester he remembers that he has Lucifer’s blood in his veins and he loses the fragile tendrils of lucidity.

            She tells him early in the morning while the birds whistle chipper as anything outside the window of the bedroom he’s being kept captive in, _when you find them, when you find my babies, I’ll let him go. Dean will be free. Free from this and free from you. We’ll do what everyone has died trying to do; we’ll finally take you out. And it doesn’t even matter anymore, does it? Because you finally see the monster that you are inside._

            She’s right, but then again she’s wrong. Because Sam always knew he’s evil inside, he felt instinctually that even if he hadn’t always been evil or wasn’t evil at the moment, he would be in the future. Now he is, a farce of angel. The spawn of Lucifer as Pam is fond of saying close to his ear, her breath puffing against his skin. But she was wrong in a fundamental way, because he didn’t want to die just because he knew that he was a monster:  

He wanted to die because _Dean_ knew.

            Thoughts careened around in his head, battering against mental walls and wreaking havoc until Sam couldn’t even stand on his own. Since the bed felt stable underneath him, if not very comfortable, Sam lay very still hoping his body’s shaking isn’t as loud as he suspects it to be.

            It’s easier to review the finer points of the hunt, aligning them in his head so the pattern is distinguishable. But it isn’t until lunchtime that Sam shares what is so apparent to him.

            Surely, there is a handprint across his face as Pam slaps him open palmed but among the earsplitting shattering that it occurring within himself the pain doesn’t register. There very well could be venom, pestilentially poisonous, as Pam spits disgusted at him, “There is no way that my girls ran away. Something took them and if you don’t find it soon, I’ll use your brother as bait to find the damn thing myself.”

            “There’s nothing to find. Nothing supernatural took your daughters,” and the words, expressionless with the undesirable edge of apathetic logic behind them, were true as they fell from Sam’s mouth.

            “So run it by me again. Just so I can understand the bullshit you’re trying to spin,” Caleb urged, his mouth set in an unpleasant line and his fingers drumming restlessly against the dinner table. 

            Sam didn’t even bother with a sigh, there wasn’t a point. He was right, certain because he had looked into everything, researched until the facts stood uncontested. Simple, black and white, and he was sure without a doubt.

            “There was a serial killer a man named Charles Eady that took a liking to your eldest daughter, Lucy, but she didn’t return the interest. He fostered a relationship with your younger daughter, Carrie, and managed to convince her to help him kidnap Lucy. They succeeded. So both of your daughters were gone and it made sense to you that something supernatural took them. But that’s not true.”

            Pam whirled on him, “It’s not possible. I raised good girls. Carrie would never be involved with a man that vile, she was just fifteen for God’s sake. She didn’t kidnap her sister.”

            But Sam had looked into it, “She did. She’d helped Charles before and this wasn’t really all that different. There were police reports of missing girls and bodies found in several counties near here and Charles had a distinct style. It wasn’t that hard to identify his victims. They kidnapped Lucy and they killed her.”

            “It’s just not true. You are a filthy liar….”

            Sam butts in before she continues because this, he’s heard this before the first time he told her what happened, “Are you going to let Dean go now? I told you what happened.”

            Caleb roars unintelligibly at him, but Sam doesn’t have the willpower to even be bothered by it. He just stares unwaveringly at Pam, “You gave me your word. I work this hunt for you and you let him go. I stay. You gave me your word,” he repeated.

            Her back remains rigid as she grips the counter, her fingers bloodlessly pale, and she doesn’t even turn around when as she throws over her shoulder, “Teach him a lesson, Caleb. Show him what little lying monsters get when they don’t uphold _their_ end of the bargain.”

            And as Caleb leads him unresistingly back to his room, Pam addresses him with motherly condemnation but Sam can only hear Dean’s voice, “I’m disappointed in you, Sam. You can’t keep lying to me and expect me to be lenient with you.”

            Caleb’s fists slam into him again and again and again and at some point he lands on the carpeted floor in a huddled mass absorbing Caleb’s torment. Yet, while the pain lovingly nudges him back into unconsciousness, Sam’s fragmented heart disintegrates even further because he’s failed Dean _again_.

            Later, he doesn’t bother stumbling to the bed, not even when a presence stands over him for an indefinite tick of time. If it’s Pam, surely she can see that he can’t do any research with one eye swollen shut and the other blinded by a moseying trickle of blood from a cut right above his eye. But the hands that gently shake his shoulders are undeniably male and unexpectedly gentle.

            The hands pet him, fingertips raising chills on his arms, before guiding him into a seated position. The hands are also attached to a voice, but Sam isn’t very interested in deciphering anything in his current state. Hands push and tug at him and he thinks he could be on his feet but he doesn’t take time to examine the thought. Just lets himself move on auto-pilot and follows, stumblingly, the directions of the hands.

            But, the voice is relentlessly calling and pleading, “Sam hey, please, c’mon I need you to wake up for me. I’ll get you out of this hell hole you just have to follow the sound of my voice, I think. I hope to God you can hear me. Please, Sammy,”  just outside the dark of his eyelids, all while the hands pet away, brushing _something_ on his back that’s so sensitive he waits for the sensation to flow from pleasurable into intolerable.

It takes several stretches of time before realism replaced the surrealism in his head, and his thoughts snapped into place into something semi-coherent. _He was in his room. His home, the cabin he lived in with …._

“Dean!” he bellowed, every unsavory emotion welling irrepressibly before Sam even manages to blink open his right eye as much as he could but then his brother swims into view, his face pulled gaunt in worry but still so very beautiful.  

“Thank God,” Dean breathed relief flooding his features like Sam waking up was salvation in and of itself. But, Sam struggles to sit up because the longer he’s awake the more the memories fill the gaps in his mind, “What’s going on? How’d we get here?”

            Dean isn’t reacting like he should be, isn’t saying what Sam knows he wants to. Dean just says, “I got you home,” And Sam can’t help but blurt, “That isn’t a part of the deal. You were supposed to go and I had to stay.”

            “What deal, Sam?” Dean probed confused but Sam couldn’t understand his misunderstanding because the deal settled impeccably in his own head, the logic seamless making perfect sense.

            “The deal I made with Pam,” he explains but then a thought occurred to him, “What did they tell you while I was working?”

            Scrubbing a frustrated hand through his hair, Dean shook his head, “They didn’t tell me anything. After you passed out, Caleb and Kyle carried you into the house and no one would tell me anything. They just threw me and Cas back into the basement.”

            “Wait, where is Cas?” Sam interrupts.

            “He’s fine, they oil trapped him with Holy oil initially. But they underestimated how strong he still is and he’s the reason, we both got out.”

            It made sense, “Well, she kept me there because I was supposed to help her find ….”

            But Dean shushes him with a quick noise, “Look I don’t care what she needed. I ganked the bitch, her boys too, for good measure. It’s probably not completely over because she still has other family that will come looking for us once they find out what happened but we’ll be prepared next time.”

            White noise fuzzed and crackled and Sam couldn’t speak for a beat. “You killed them,” he says and Dean grunts an affirmative.

            “She was going to kill me, afterwards,” Sam picked at a stray blue thread on the bedspread he was situated on, “She promised to let you go and then she would do what needed to be done.”

            “What needed to be done,” Dean scoffed viciously, “Pam was a manipulative whore and she played us. But she was wrong,” and his voice broke, “so fucking wrong about you.”

            “I drank Satan’s blood,” Sam didn’t think he would ever be able to say it, acknowledge that it happened but it skidded out as easy as anything, “I didn’t think I could do anything worse than drinking demon blood, but apparently I can. And I did. I am a monster, Dean, so what Pam did by kidnapping you was wrong. And yes, she manipulated us. But she wasn’t wrong about me.”

            Dean sank heavily into a chair next to Sam’s bed, like Sam’s admission aged him forty years, “You shouldn’t have had to find out like that.”

            Sam’s neck protested as he whipped to face his brother, “Did you know?”

            “Pam told me yeah, when I got there. Kept calling you a Hell spawn and the offspring of a fallen angel,” Dean hummed dangerously, cheeks flushed red and there is a ferocity lingering in his face.

            Whisper-soft, “You knew.”

 Dean was leaning forward, elbows pitched on his knees, undoubtedly he captured every word, “Yeah,” he agreed.

Sam couldn’t fathom how his brother’s love stretched so far, a devotion so encompassing, but he couldn’t distrust it, he could only murmur, “Thank you.”

            Dean grimaced, “You don’t have to fucking thank me, Sam. It’s my job. It’s what I do. I protect you when I don’t royally screw it up. And I’m always …..”

            A wet pressure against his mouth had him looking down in surprise, Sam had contorted himself to reach Dean’s mouth, “Shut up, Dean,” he panted in his brother’s mouth.

            He brushed his lips against Dean’s in a light nuzzle because it felt good, and Dean couldn’t make himself push anything further just held himself open to Sam’s ministrations. Let his mouth fall open as Sam’s tongue sought entrance and let his brother explore the hard enamel and soft tissue.

            Then, Sam tugged at his shoulders trying to pull him onto the bed. “Sammy, I can’t. I can’t do this to you,” Dean pleaded, though of what he would be doing he wasn’t sure. Just that he shouldn’t.

            Sam’s wings burst into the room, though without the gore like the first time, and they flexed and shook meaningfully. Cupping his jaw with one hand, Sam ran a thumb over the generous swell of Dean’s bottom lip before saying deadly quiet, “It’s okay. I found out that I have these,” another jostle of feathers, “because of Lucifer; pretty sure I can handle a little brother-loving.”

Dean took his time before nodding, “And you’re my brother. Not a monster. You spent almost a century in Hell and here you are—functioning. If you drank Lucifer’s blood, then so be it. I don’t care because it doesn’t matter to me,” he coughs before adding, “It doesn’t change how I feel about you.”

*******

            Oil slicked everything from where they lay sprawled naked and sweaty together: Dean’s fingers were drenched as the carded through feathers and all their saturated clothes was tossed haphazardly across Sam’s room. Feathers and fluff littered the bed and the surrounding area which Sam probably would have been mortified about if they didn’t feel so incredible against bare skin. Idly sliding a quill up Dean’s sternum and teasingly along his nipple, Sam felt an intense satisfaction to hear his brother lose himself underneath him.

An effervescent citrusy smell from the oil inundated the heated room along with the combination of their musk, sweat, and hints of the shampoo that they both share and the scent fogs Dean’s head until he feels drunk on his brother. Dean mouths at Sam’s shoulder, biting down briefly just to hear Sam’s breathy curse, and rakes tender fingers down his wings. Sam’s movements’ shudder, hips moving in jerky circles and erection rubbing against Dean’s trim stomach, as Dean tweaks over his oil glands.

“Fucking hell, Dean,” Sam gasps, his body conflicted as it struggles to arch into the pressure and away from it simultaneously.

Dean smirks shrewdly from his position underneath him while Sam’s hands couldn’t decide what they wanted to touch more—petting at Dean’s face, down the curve of his jaw, pinch at his pretty pink nipples—shifting restlessly over every inch of Dean he could reach from his position in Dean’s lap. He studiously ignores Dean’s cock for the moment though, despite Dean’s desperate huffs each time Sam wanders down close to the sharp cut of his hip.

Sam squirms down while pushing Dean flat on his back; nipping, licking, sucking all the freckled skin he is suddenly allowed to touch. Spreading Dean’s legs, Sam begins at his ankle and lays kisses up to his knees and into the smooth, pale flesh of his inner thigh. 

“Sammy,” Dean pleads as Sam sucks a purpling bruise so high up his thigh Dean’s cock is smacking him in the face, “please suck me. Just need your mouth,” he whines.

Obligingly, Sam leans up to take Dean’s cock into his mouth. He hasn’t sucked many guys off before, but he has enough experience. At first, he just nurses the head, tiny lapping flicks of the tongue and he can taste the saltiness of Dean’s precum.

“Oh God, it’s good. So fucking wet and warm. Your mouth’s perfect, baby, think you can take me deeper.” Dean’s babbling, his hand tightening sporadically in his hair, as he fights the urge to thrust up into the silky, slippery ecstasy of Sam’s mouth. But, Sam takes pity and finally takes more of Dean’s cock into his mouth willing himself not to choke as it goes deeper and deeper. Holding himself down for a few seconds, he hums playfully listening to Dean shout as the vibrations travel up his cock.

It only takes a few tries to set up a steady rhythm of bobbing his head getting his brother’s cock sopping wet with spit trailing down over his cock and down to his balls. Doesn’t take long before Dean is pulling him up by the hair, panting, “Hey, slow down, Sammy.”

 But Sam torturously runs his tongue over Dean’s sensitive slit before contorting his face in a mock-pout, “Want you to come all over my face,” he says.

There’s a thunk as Dean’s head hits the headboard helplessly, but he plays with Sam’s feathers as he groans, “You’re trying to kill me here.”

But as Sam loosely jacks Dean’s cock in one gigantic hand, enjoying how the stiff flesh peeks above his fist and rolling him thumb wide across the head, he asks, “Can I fuck you, De?”

Dean’s body stiffens up and his face pinches closed in discomfort, he mumbles, “I’ve never swung that way before.” And Sam guesses that it isn’t a completely closed subject, that if he pushed in the right way he might be able to bring Dean around.

But, for the time being, he offers, “Or, I could ride you into this mattress.” At Dean’s near-frantic nod and the relief that relaxes his entire body, Sam chuckles and reaches to fetch the lube in his bedside table. Dean stops him with a gentle hand on his wrist, “We don’t need it.”

Sam turns to him with an incredulous, “Dean, there isn’t any way your cock is going to fit inside me without lube.”

“Not’s what I meant,” Dean huffs testily while his hands drift down Sam’s back landing lightly on his oil glands. Rubbing fingers over each gland and pinching at them gingerly, he coaxes liberal spurts of oil onto his hands. Sam transfers his weight helpfully and spreads himself open as Dean trails slick fingers down and over his hole massaging the furled muscle without breaching him.

“Are you sure you want this?” Dean probes, overbearing caution halting his movements.

Sam tilts his head so he can seal a forceful kiss on Dean’s mouth, a kiss so rough and sloppy he tastes a faint tang of blood, but he doesn’t pull away only latches on harder. Dean grunts under the onslaught and takes the distraction to slide a finger in. Sam keens inside Dean’s mouth but enthusiastically moves down against the finger and begs for another one.

Scooping more wing oil, he adds another finger and scissors them inside Sam stretching him thoroughly and efficient. The wings beat senselessly against the walls of Sam’s room as they unfurled to their complete wingspan, but Sam didn’t bother with curbing their excess movement as Dean’s fingers slipped out of him and he guided his brother’s cock to his entrance.

Sinking down inch by inch, Sam whines, a high nonsensical noise, as he’s stuffed to the brim with Dean; like Dean’s pushing every evil thing Sam’s done and replacing it with himself. There’s no finesse when Sam finally seats himself in Dean’s lap again, Dean’s cock buried inside him, and he swivels his hips in tiny figure eights feeling the starburst of colors and sensations as Dean wraps an oil-smooth hand over his weeping erection.

With Dean’s firm hands on his hips, Sam uses his leverage to raise himself up again before sinking back down the harsh length and he whimpers low in his throat because everything felt _good_. He pushed himself into a hurried, unforgiving pace; neither had the willpower to savor the moment. Chasing orgasm, he sensed the pleasure dangling tantalizingly right outside his reach as Dean thrust his hips up to meet Sam’s movements downwards unerringly striking his prostrate.

He finally came, spilling messily over his brother’s torso, screamingly overloaded as Dean tugged his feathers and his brother followed him into an orgasmic high as his inner walls clamped down on Dean’s cock. They collapsed into a sweaty heap, managing luckily to roll out of the wet spot, and Dean pulled out with a wince.  

Sleep seemed imminent as Dean threw a lazy arm over Sam’s waist and pulled him so that he could rest his head on Dean’s chest; the wings floated over the bed—a makeshift, feathery canopy—muting the evening sunlight. But a wayward thought interrupted Sam’s travels towards slumber,

“We should probably start hunting again. Move around for a while, keep our skills up if we might have to face more of Pam’s family.”

Dean hummed out an agreeing noise, “But, don’t worry baby, you have the best hunter in the world to protect you,” he sing-songed teasingly.

Sam snorted, “Yeah and you have a Hell angel to watch out for your sorry ass.”

Dean knocked his shoulder against Sam’s, “Wrong, you’re my angel, bitch.”

A time-old tradition that felt like home, and love, and Dean, “Whatever, jerk.”

             

 

             

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Kudos are hugs and comments are love. I am very open to suggestions for new fics. Let me know your thoughts, lovelies. :)


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